Apr
11
“All time is an illusion. Lunchtime, doubly so.”
Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
Craig Kirchoff
Apr
2
Video for Tax Foundation: We’re Number 1!
In our latest work for the Tax Foundation you’ll learn two important things:
1. The U.S. now has the highest corporate tax rate of any industrialized nation in the world and;
2. The world’s largest ketchup bottle (though they spell it “catsup”) is in Collinsville, Illinois.
Mar
26
GREY AREA
(Apologies to the late greats David Foster Wallace, Joseph Heller and The Simpsons, all of whom would have a good case that I’m ripping them off here.)
10:45am
ABC studios
Conference Room J
WRITERS MEETING
ABC studios
Conference Room J
WRITERS MEETING
Edward Tryte, Assistant Senior VP of Primetime: Alright everyone settle down. Now, as you all know, one of our marquee shows, Grey’s Anatomy, is about to enter its eigth season. We’ve called you all here because, quite frankly, we have no idea how we’re going to pull it off. Every character has already been married, divorced, come out as gay and killed someone. As of right now your job is to breathe life into this thing. I expect genre-shattering, consciousness-expanding art out of you - stories that connect viewers with the shared awareness of all mankind. This is MISSION CRITICAL, people. So what have you got? WRITER #6: I hear ya chief. I think I’ve got the thread of something here that can turn this thing around. Imagine this: It’s a weekday morning and things are already tense at Seattle Grace - Our doctors are consumed with the life and death decisions they make every minute, not to mention the recent adoption/divorce/professional epiphany they’re dealing with. When - BAM! - the whole narrative gets inverted by a gunman who comes into the hospital. Those charged with saving lives must find a way to perserve their own. TRYTE: Come on! We’ve done that at least four times already in this show. The damn hospital has more gun-toating maniacs than a tea party rally in Chatanooga - not that I’d have first-hand experience with that sort of thing. Real people terrify me. WRITER #2: Amen to that, Tryte And True. That aside, I’ve got something for you. Two words, Time Travel. TRYTE: Go on. WRITER #2: Two more words: Lucid Dreaming. TRYTE: You’ve hooked me. Now, reel me in. WRITER #2: In a two-hour event, Dr. Meredith Grey finds herself unmoored from the fabric of space-time. Suddenly she’s in an apocalyptic near-future where a single mistake she, herself made while distracted in a hospital lab has created a zombie race that terrorizes humanity. She must set things right, but how? TRYTE: You’ve caught me. I’m in the boat. Now release me. WRITER # 2: In the second “very special episode,” Meredith realizes the whole thing’s a dream. But before she can wake, she must control her dream and return things to the way they were. TRYTE: The creation of art. THAT is what we have witnessed here today. Book that one. What else we got? WRITER #1: Maybe a little something about love and race? TRYTE: Not bad. Someone check to see if anyone’s done anything like that before. WRITER #8: May I speak freely? TRYTE: Quickly would be better. Profitably would be best. WRITER #8: What if we’re not giving the audience enough credit? I mean, we crank out this over-the-top, narcissistic stuff again and again all set to corporate faux-indie rock. Isn’t the real drama of life in the margins and NOT in gun-toting maniacs and endless life-saving or -ending surgeries? You know, most real conflicts hide in the small folds of life. That quiet nervousness, the subtle loneliness we share… great art - REAL art - seems to come from a place like that.
I think THAT is what we should be trying to create.
(Awkward silence) TRYTE: you’re fired.WRITER #1 to WRITER #3: (whispers) What did he say?!
TRYTE: No matter. Listen, I’ve got another meeting in 17 minutes - we think Celebrity Wife Swap has a real shot at an Emmy this year. Let’s crank out some more art here…
Mar
21
Sending Video in the Mail
[[posterous-content:pid___0]]
We get to do some interesting projects at work, but this one was something entirely different and, in my biased opinion, very cool.
Thanks to the Technology CEO Council and our friends at Tax Foundation, we produced 5 videos on corporate tax policy. The catch is that after they were all done, they were distributed by mail.
As you can tell from the poorly-shot cell phone video above, (sorry about that) the mail piece is slightly bigger than a greeting card and not much thicker. On the inside is a screen and 5 buttons which let you choose which video to watch. The screen resolution is surprisingly good and the speaker on the back puts out some good sound.
A huge thanks to the Technology CEO Council and Tax Foundation for showing us this cool little piece of technology and for letting us work on it.
The videos are a continuation of the series we’ve been doing for Tax Foundation and are also on YouTube.
Corporate Taxes: Falling Behind By Standing Still
Corporate Taxes: Advantages of a Territorial Tax System
Corporate Taxes: Comparing Effective Tax Rates
Incent to Invent (A Technology CEO Council Video)
Corporate Taxes: Winning
Mar
14
A Sign Tech is Booming - Funding Without an Idea
Feb
18
The Inventor of E-mail on Systems
Important quote from V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai, inventor of e-mail. From today’s Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/innovations).”The problems of today’s world are not just learning how to build a computer better or writing a software program. A lot of that stuff is being outsourced, like in America. The big problems are large-scale systems - so the educational system, transportation system, relationships as a system. These systems are very, very complex…”
Feb
17
A Sign My Rocking Days Are Over
The ads on YouTube provided a nice reminder of the demographic that is checking out the Van Halen video. (ie the demographic to which I belong.)
Jan
21
Great Quote on Complexity
”Sometime in the past decade…we stopped analyzing emergence and started creating it. We began building self-organizing systems into our software applications, our video games, our art, our music. We built emergent systems to recommend new books, recognize our voices, or find mates.”
-Steven Johnson in his book, Emergence
Great Quote on Complexity
”Sometime in the past decade…we stopped analyzing emergence and started creating it. We began building self-organizing systems into our software applications, our video games, our art, our music. We built emergent systems to recommend new books, recognize our voices, or find mates.”
-Steven Johnson in his book, Emergence
Dec
7
Video for Tax Foundation: Falling Behind by Standing Still
www.youtube.com/watch?v=kly8pjEU2g0
A while ago we were lucky to do a video for the Tax Foundation on the issue of Tax Deferral (seen here.) We loved the project and had hoped to revisit it someday.
We’re happy to say that earlier this week, Tax Foundation released the follow-
up video. Done in a similar style, the video examines the issue of the
Corporate Tax Rate.
Complex issue. Simple video.
A big thanks to Tax Foundation for the chance to work on this project.
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